F 864 
.H89 
Copy 1 



THK 



CalUbnla of tto Padres; 



OR, 



FOOTPRINTS OF /NCIENT COMMUNISM 



By Mrs. Elizabeth Hughes. 



San ^rancisco ; 

PUBLISHED BY I. N. CHOYNSKI, CoBNKB SKCONK AND JkSSIR Sl'S. 

1875- 






51596 



[Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight hundred and 
seventy-four by 
I. N. CHOYNSKI, 
in the offi ce of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.] 





H FOOTPRINTS OF /NCIENT COMMU^I 









tit 



Bv Mrs. Elizabeth Hughes. 



M 



i 



m 






^AN j^RANCISCO ; 

Published ky I. N. CHOYNSKI, Cornkr Second and Jessie Sts 
1875- 




ANTIQUARIAN BOOK STORE. 



; W. emfmm 



IMPORTER OF 



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School Books, Novels, 

^TATIONEf^Y AND fy^cY floODf,, 

AT WHOLESALE AND RETAIL, 

Corner of Second and Jessie Streets, 

Subscriptions received for all Eastern and EuropeafPub- 
hcations. Old Books bought, sold and exchanged. Liberal 
Books and Periodicals always on hand. 

AH the latest Novels and New Books received as soon as 
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DEDICATION. 



To all those whose interest in the present of our noble State, 
and hopes for its rapidly unfolding future, lead them to look back 
to its singular and remarkable past, this little work is dedicated. 

With no party feeling, no sectarian bias, to the great heart of 
humanity, I confide these pages, and should any chord throb in 
unison with mine, as we retrace the marvellous history of our 
State, and point to the possibilities of its future — in that I shall 
find my best reward. 

From all those to whom familiar scenes and places may be en- 
deared by the associations of unselfish effort and brave endeavor, 
I invite a hearing, and from those to whom in any land California 
is dear as the homes or resting place of some loved being, I be- 
speak a kindly welcome for these pages. 

K. H. 



THE 



CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES; 



OR, 



FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 



By Mrs. ELIZABETH HUGHES. 



Looking at the progressive and liberal movement of the 
present century, it appears, superficially considered, like a 
vast process of disintegration, which alike menaces danger 
to the individual and destruction to present political and 
social systems. It is only when we look deeper that we see 
that this young, new and glowing life throbbing in the veins 
of the present century, means neither death nor decomposi- 
tion, but struggle to throw off effete conditions, which shall 
result in a more complete return to spiritual and physical 
health, both on the part of society and of the individual. 
Still, how much we have to learn, how deep the necessity of 
taking counsel with God in us, with God in each other, that 
we may know whither we are going and at what we are 
aiming, and do not fall into the many snares that beset us in 
the uncertain twilight of the day in which we live. To re- 
ceive truth and light as naturally as the earth receives rain 
and sunshine is the soul's happy normal condition. In the 
conflicts of the present day it is sometimes interesting to turn 
1 



2 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

for a while to the past, to remember what was before us on 
the land we now tread — we, the pilgrims of a day, so soon to 
pass away, even as those who preceded us have passed away 
in the long procession of the centuries, leaving behind them 
the memorials of their existence, their ideas in concrete mat- 
ter, even as we enstamp ourselves on the images we ourselves 
create, and we are visible long after we cease to be so. 

Will the reader now accompany me for a short time to the 
early days of California, long previous to '49, and make some 
acquaintance with the land and people, while the gold still 
slept in the hills, and herds strayed and fed over the 
millions which the strong hand of the Anglo-Saxon has torn 
from the soil? Scattered up and down our rapidly growing 
State, monuments of an epoch already past, stand the rudely 
built, yet picturesque edifices known as Missions. These 
consist of a church, generally substantially built of adobe 
and plastered, of a peculiar, but not ungraceful style of archi- 
tecture, and various outbuildings subserving the purposes of 
barns, granaries or dwellings. These Missions, from their 
attractive situations, have often become the sites of towns, 
and, in many cases, the pueblos or villages formed by the 
settlement of the Spanish soldiers attached to the garrison of 
the Mission, the germs of cities. 

Such is Los Angeles, the seeds of whose prosperity were sown 
by the grape culture introduced by the Padres, and whose 
flocks and herds, covering hill and valley, were mainly due to 
the enterprise and energy of men who, in the 17th and 18th 
centuries, worked not for themselves but for their idea of 
duty. That idea might not be yours or mine. It might not 
have been theirs, had they lived to-day, but they were faith- 
ful to it, and to-day the world reaps the fruit of the trees 
that they planted, and of the seed that they sowed. Father 
Ugarte, in 1701, imported cattle and breeding animals, and 
was the first white man who broke ground in California, for 
the purpose of raising grain. The Mission San Gabriel is 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 8 

niue miles from Los Angeles. It is built on slightly elevated 
ground, a noble structure overlooking the whole valley 
towards the east. The orange orchard of the Padres is still 
in full bearing. Father Zelueda first planted the vine in 
San Gabriel. He planted 75,000 stocks. This Mission was 
founded in 1771. 3000 Indians were attached to it. It pos- 
sessed 100,000 cattle, 20,000 horses, and more than 40,000 
sheep. There were superb orchards, aud kitchen gardens 
well fenced bj r hedges of prickly pear, the remains of which 
exist to-day. And now, at this date, 1875, after an Ameri- 
can occupation of so many years, the traveller as he passes 
along that beautiful and fertile valley, watered by its two 
rivers, the San Gabriel and the Los Angeles, on casting 
his eye on to the gentle slope of the beautiful mountain, 
sees an edifice that, at the distance, looks princely. On no 
other such building does the eye rest. American enterprise 
has reared nothing that so attracts the eye. It is the antique 
Mission of San Gabriel. On approaching nearer, you see 
that it is coarsely, though substantially built, as might be 
expected from its Indian workmanship ; but it was planned 
from the soul, and still speaks to the soul. 

Father Zelueda had negotiated with an American house to 
make a fence round the vineyard, aud was on the point of hav- 
ing all the materials ready when the secularization took place. 
This community sent a ship to San Bias every year, loaded 
with oil, hemp and flax. Occasionally, one was despatched 
to Lima with soap and tallow. Bret Harte and others sneer 
at their treatment of the Indians. But are the Indians any 
better off to-day, lying around the streets of Los Angeles like 
masterless dogs, and half the time in the calaboose or chain- 
gang ? There are races that seem never to rise beyond 
childhood, and need wise training. San Diego was the first 
Mission founded by the Franciscans in Upper California, and 
was called the Mother Mission; it is now called old San 
Diego, and is three miles from the shore. New Town, or 



4 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

South San Diego is on the Bay, a beautifully situated and 
pleasant town. The Franciscans took possession of the coun- 
try after the expulsion of the Jesuits, and founded most of 
the Missions in Upper California, as far north as San Fran- 
cisco, which queen city of the Pacific was named after their 
patron saint. Lying in one of the most beautiful valleys 
south of the Tejon Pass, are the remains of the Mission of 
Santa Isabel. Where once the bell summoned the Indians 
to church, all is now silent. The American ranchero does 
not keep Sunday as a general thing. He sits and calculates 
the time when his earnings shall enable him to enter tem- 
porarily or permanently into the life of cities, or he enjoys in 
his isolation the glories and advantages which nature pours 
around him: — the unequalled climate, the mountain chase, 
the savage freedom, the independent life. The ruined church 
and buildings are now occupied as dwellings and storehouses, 
and the beautiful valley, with its gently rising hills, is a cat- 
tle ranch. 

San Fernando, about twelve miles from Los Angeles, 
is remarkable for picturesque and tropical beauty. A widely 
extended valley, with nearly a level surface, bounded by 
distant ranges of mountains, at first presents itself. These 
mountains have a peculiarly barren look, but this defect is 
almost compensated for by the various and beautiful shades 
of color they assume — blue, brown and purple — contrasting 
finely with the clear transparent skies and with the even sur- 
face of the valley. The road is bordered by a low growth 
of shrubbery and cactus. On turning the point of a hill, you 
come suddenly upon the Mission buildings, which, with their 
surrounding gardens, stand seemingly isolated in the midst 
of a desert plain, and produce a most beautiful effect. The 
gardens were enclosed by walls, but the graceful palm rose 
above them, and groves of olive, lemon and orange trees 
could be seen within. Outside the walls, the surface is bar- 
ren and gravelly, and the fertility within is the result of irri- 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 5 

gatiou. The building presented an imposing appearance, 
having a long portico formed by a colonnade with twenty 
arches, built of brick or adobe, plastered and whitewashed. 
The floor was paved with tiles, and a pleasant promenade in 
front of the edifice was afforded. In the days of the pros- 
perity of the Mission, a large fountain, with a circular basin 
ten feet or more in diameter, rose directly in front of the main 
building. This fountain is now in ruins. Its beautiful jet 
no longer refreshes the palm trees, and is blown back upon 
the flowers. A great variety of tropical fruits still exist 
there, bearing testimony to the skillful horticulture and in- 
dustry of the community; and though the forms of the men 
who reared the colonnade and sought refreshment and relaxa- 
tion in these walks, from the cares of business or from the 
labors of their mission, have long since passed away, their 
memory still survives in the breath of the orange blossoms, 
in the melancholy and sweetness of the palm, the tree of the 
desert, the tree of the solitary, communing more with the 
heavens than with the earth, disdaining to spread its branches 
near the soil, but lifting up in the blue air far above our 
heads, its flowers and its fruit. The message of peace and 
good will to man still flows forth from the vines which they 
planted, and the new plants with which they enriched the 
soil. I seem to see them yet, those men of peace and earnest- 
ness, those pioueers of the first Missions — Ugarte and Salva 
Tierra. Smilingly they greet the Franciscan, and congratu- 
late him on his success. Can we not fancy that love for a 
spot so endeared by long years of toil and endeavor may yet 
draw them near a place sacred to so many recollections ? 
Has Ugarte forgotten his beloved California, for which his 
hands and head toiled so willingly ? Has Salva Tierra for- 
gotten the privations of La Paz, which were crowned by the 
abundance of San Fernando ? No. I think that in the 
glorious moonlights of that southern clime, the eyes of the 
seer might discern the forms of the Franciscans, as they 



6 THE CALIFORNIA OP THE PADRES ; 

glide through the colonnade or steal down the deserted walks, 
white with the rain of orange blossoms, to the ruined foun- 
tain. As they converse together they seem to smile, for with 
eyes unsealed and annointed with eternal day, they descry a 
brighter and happier time for the pleasant land of their adop- 
tion, when united effort shall bring back peace and plenty, 
and the laws of God written on the heart, brain and body of 
man shall be reverenced as much as that which is written in 
books, and they are in peace, requiescat in pace, for they are 
in love, and hope, and faith. 

Let us go farther north. Near the city of San Francisco 
is the Mission Dolores, built about a hundred years ago. It 
consists of a church with quite extensive out-buildings. The 
adobe walls of the church are three or four feet thick. The 
church is still used for divine service. The screen behind 
the altar is decked with gilding and an harmonious mixture 
of colors, figures of saints in relief, rude but not unpleas- 
ing, suggestive of former times and of an earlier age. The 
ceiling is stained, the seats are of oak, and there are little 
pictures of saints upon the walls. A spirited fresco, the 
work of some artist-priest, some California Fra Bartolomeo, 
occupies part of one side the building. The church joins the 
cemetery. You enter a little wicket gate which leads to the 
field of the dead. It is a quiet, peaceful place. I know not 
where there is a pleasanter rest for weary flesh and aching 
hearts. It fronts the south, and the hills, covered in winter 
aad spring with velvety verdure, close round it, and, as it 
were, shelter it. Roses creep around the tombs and run up 
the walls of the church. A low wall fences it in from the 
adjoining meadows. The Mission is the terminus of the 
street cars. Through low-lying sand-hills, following the car- 
track, you arrive at San Francisco. On arriving at Market 
street, a somewhat stately building faces you — a church and 
college dedicated to St. Ignatius, the founder of the Order of 
the Jesuits. This feared and detested Order, then, again asserts 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 7 

itself. Expelled from California, and replaced by the Fran- 
ciscans, it rears its head again, and shows its indomitable 
front. Still we must confess that for us the interest attaches 
to the antique church, the simple shrine, the homely Mission. 
The new buildings are substantial and convenient. They 
strike the eye but do not touch the heart. We feel instinc- 
tively that the monastery and the church belong to the past; 
that the religious sentiment must have its supreme place in 
the grand coronal arch, but must not crush out, but rather 
guard and protect the other attributes of man's sacred and 
complex nature; for there is not one of these that can be 
spared or ignored without visiting its neglect or extinction 
with the severest and most tremendous penalties. 

The Mission of Santa Barbara is still a picturesque and 
attractive object in the landscape, whether from the sea or 
from the shore. The church is of stone, one hundred and 
sixty feet long by sixty wide; the walls are eight feet in 
thickness; the height of the nave is forty feet. It was 
flanked with two towers, with rich-toned bells brought from 
Spain. The altar is adorned with the images of Saints, and 
before the altar is a trap door, leading to vaults where are 
deposited the remains of the Mission Fathers who died at 
the station. The Fathers' house adjoined the church, and 
looked toward the sea. Rows of Indian huts in adobe 
were at a little distance from the house. A pleasant garden 
was laid out near the church, in which flourished the fruits 
of the tropics with those of the temperate zone. The orange 
grew beside the apple; the pear mingled its white blossoms 
with the almond. But the expense and taste with which 
the water was brought into the Mission is what most attracted 
the eye and showed the love of beauty which, in the wilder- 
ness, still clung to the men who had passed their youth and 
manhood in courts, camps or cities. I use the past tense in 
6peaki ng of this, as it is very possible that, in the rapid 
march of improvements in the now flourishing town of Santa 



8 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

Barbara, many of these traces may be obliterated. Water 
was brought from beyond the church, around the brow of a 
gently rising hill, to a square reservoir of beautiful masonry. 
Near this were the ruins of a grist mill, and not far from the 
mill a small stone edifice, surmounted with a cross, which 
appears to have been used as a bath. Outside the door of 
the bath was a lion's head, from which poured a beautiful 
jet of water. In front of the church was a fountain, with a 
series of circular basins of simple yet elegant shape, from the 
top of which the water burst and fell from one to the other, 
till it reached a larger basin below. From this it was led 
off a short distance to the statue of a grizzly bear, from 
whose mouth it was ejected into a reservoir of solid masonry, 
six feet wide and seventy long. Around these fountains were 
solid, cemented stone pavements and ducts to convey off the 
the surplus water. In a climate where fertility as well as 
comfort depends upon irrigation, nothing could be more 
judicious or in better taste. 

Such were some of the relics of early California. To me 
they possess a peculiar charm. The work done in them was 
done in the face of many dangers, aud oftentimes in suffering 
and privation. The large ranch houses, of a date coeval 
with the latter period of the history of the Missions, have 
also their own peculiar and picturesque interest. Life was 
carried on there in a grand, old, patriarchal fashion. There 
was room for the development of strong and powerful natures, 
who made .themselves known far and wide, like the brave 
and eccentric Col. "Williams of the Rancho del Chino, whose 
p-enerosity almost kept alive, at one time, the starving Mor- 
mon emigration of San Bernardino. Mr. Rubidoux's ranch 
is another picturesque dwelling among the hills, where, at 
one time, riding alone and caught in a severe storm, I was 
hospitably received. Mr. Rubidoux was a French gentle- 
man, a cotemporary of Col. Williams, with one of those fine 
aristocratic countenances that seem to belong to the ancient 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 9 

regime. He was unable to leave his room from an accident, 
which illustrates the primitive mode of living of even the 
wealthy rancheros. He had not slept in a bed for many 
years; but one night, from some unforeseen circumstance, 
he was induced to occupy one. Hearing some unusual noise, 
he turned out very suddenly, and, not being prepared for so 
unusual a descent, lamed himself for life. The calm which 
the contemplation of these peaceful communities, faulty as 
they might be in many respects, has shed into my soul is 
very delightful. ' ; Feace I leave with you, my peace I give 
unto you," is breathed into our souls at times with accents 
sweet as a gale from heaven. The conflict of interests in 
present conditioned society is unfavorable to the develop- 
ment of the supreme satisfaction of life, and everywhere an- 
tagonisms are becoming more bitter and more pronounced. 
The fight between starvation on the one hand, and the ple- 
thora of riches on the other; between the voluptuous satiety 
of the rich and the terrible lone starvation of multitudes who 
are going mourning through life, orphaned in the midst of 
plenty; the desperate fatality which makes the rich grow 
richer and the poor poorer every day; and the crowding of 
all these volcanic elements into our large cities, where, at 
any moment, a spark may light on the powder magazine of 
all these pent-up feelings and cause an explosion — all this 
makes the social atmosphere heavy, even for those who are 
out of the vortex of present suffering. What must it be, 
then, for those who see no hope before them — whose outlook 
in life is as blank as a prison court-yard. For this reason, 
there is a very wide and growing interest felt on the subject 
of community life, and these interesting relics may suggest 
some thoughts on that subject. 

THE CONQUEST OF CALIFORNIA. 

We will now go back some three hundred years and see 
by what steps the conquest of California was effected, the 
2 



10 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

kind of people that were then living there, and what part the 
Missions played therein. In the year of our Lord 1526, the 
country now called California was as much unknown as the 
interior of Africa is to us at present. The restless and all-in- 
quiring spirit was just beginning to awaken in man, which 
seeks to know and explore every nook and corner of his 
grand inheritance, the globe, with all its diverse climates 
and conditions. At that time the Viceregal Court of Spain 
and New Mexico was the seat of great power and splendor. 
The daring Spanish conqueror, Cortez, was then in the zenith 
of his power, married to a noble Spanish lady, and having at 
his control the vast wealth of the conquered countries. De- 
siring to discover and subject still more territory, he fitted 
out two ships at Acapulco, commanded by Don Juan Xime- 
nes, which sailed to La Paz; but on landing, himself and 
twenty others were killed. Cortez, hearing of this, under- 
took an expedition, but returned without success. No less 
than seven expeditions sailed from New Spain for California, 
all of which were failures. These various expeditions in- 
cluded the space from 1526 to 1683, which was the date of 
Admiral Ontondo's expedition, with whom came Father 
Rino to La Paz. But even this last expedition was a failure, 
for he gave an account to the Viceroy of New Mexico that, 
besides wasting three whole years, there had been expended 
225,000 crowns of the royal revenue. It was decided that 
the conquest of California was impracticable by these means, 
and that the reduction should be offered to the Society of 
Jesuits, with the offer of the necessary sums. There does 
seem something strange in this, when you reflect upon what 
Spain was at that time — flushed with success, mad for con- 
quest, in the most haughty and proud period of the whole 
Spanish monarchy — in the lifetime of such men as Cortez 
and Pizzaro, the plumed darlings of success and conquest, 
before whom the civilized empire of Mexico, its traditions 
and government had melted away as a dream of the night. 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 11 

And these men and their peers to be foiled before the iso- 
lated, unknown and northerly California, and call its conquest 
impracticable, is a singular fact in history and in the pro- 
gramme which higher powers arrange for nations and indi- 
viduals, must have had some wise and determinate purpose. 
The General of the Jesuits decided that, though they were 
willing to supply missionaries, that they did not wish to take 
upon themselves the temporal concerns of the conquest; and, 
in short, looked upon it much as did the temporal powers, 
as an impracticable and not feasible undertaking. 

The Mission settlements of the Jesuits in California were 
not so much the work of the Order as of the invincible en- 
ergy of three men, directed hither by some powerful spiritual 
impression, who, in the midst of all discouragements and dif- 
ficulties, never lost heart, ready and willing at any time to 
die at their post, and of rare practical ability. These men were 
Father Rino, Father Juan Ugarte, and Father Salva Tierra. 
Father Rino had been Professor of Mathematics at Ingol- 
stadt, where his liberality of feeling and sweetness of disposi- 
tion won great respect. He had considerable scientific 
training, and was quite a practical man. It was he who first 
ascertained that Lower California was a peninsula, and not 
an island. Father Salva Tierra was a Jesuit Missionary in 
Pimeria, Sonora. Him Father Rino interested in the Cali- 
fornia work. His perseverance and energy in this undertak- 
ing were remarkable. Several times he applied to the So- 
ciety for a license to undertake the work, and was refused, the 
General looking upon it as impracticable. At last he got a 
license, and, in 1697, came to Mexico to raise collections for 
beginning the work. There he met Father Ugarte, who 
was then Professor of Philosophy in the College there. 
Many an interview did these two men have in that grand old 
city of Mexico, till Salva Tierra, fresh from his wild pastorate 
of Sonora, influenced the mind of Urgate with the desire to 
participate with him in the toils and dangers of his unknown 



12 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

but glorious Mission, and relinquish the calm ease of his stu- 
dent's life and the enjoyment of the revenues of his chair of 
philosophy in the richest city of the New World for the dan- 
gers, hardships, labors and privations which were to consti- 
tute the basis of the life laid out before him. 

Father Tierra then left Mexico and went to Sinaloa, ap- 
pointing Ugarte as his agent in Mexico. He set sail from 
Mexico with an escort of ten soldiers, commanded by Don 
Juan Tortoleros. On the third day they made California, 
and landed not tar from the site of the present town of Loreta, 
where the coast forms itself into a half-moon, five leagues 
from point to point. A convenient spot near a watering 
place, about a league and a half from the shore, was chosen 
as an encampment, and the provisions and animals were 
landed, together with the baggage ; the Father, though the 
head of the expedition, bearing the first load on his shoul- 
ders. The barracks for the little garrison were then built, 
and a line of circumvallatiou was thrown up. In the centre 
a tent was pitched for a temporary chapel, and before the 
tent was erected a crucifix, with a garland of the beautiful 
and brilliant flowers of the country. Everything being dis- 
posed of in the best way possible, the image of our Lady of 
Loreto, as patroness of the conquest, was brought from the ship 
and placed with proper solemnity in the chapel. Such was 
the first successful attempt at the conquest of California; the 
image of a woman, the simple faith of a man, a man of works 
as well as of prayer and faith! May we not be proud of 
such a conquest and such a history? No battle drum sounded 
the alarm, no flag was lowered, no blood was spilt; but from 
a quiet ship, on a serene day, under these glorious heavens, 
came a chief with no sword but that of the Spirit and the 
image of a lovely woman engarlanded with flowers. What 
other nation has had such a conquest and such a history ? 

Possession was then taken of the country in the name of 
the king, after the manner of European voj^agers. They 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 13 

were dependent on New Spain for subsistence, as no supplies 
were then procurable in the country. Provisions ran so short 
that there were only three small sacks of maize and three of 
meal left, and these were full of maggots, but before they 
quite got to starvation point, the " San Joseph," with supplies 
from Father Ugarte, hove in sight. Father Tierra says, in 
his journal: " I write this narrative, uncertain whether I shall 
live to make an end of it, for our necessity from want of sup- 
plies is very great." Encouraged and strengthened by the 
timely aid, they erected works of defence and buildings 
within the camp, which was enlarged and fortified with a 
palisade and the strong branches of trees. A chapel for 
placing our Lady in was built of stone and clay, besides 
three little dwelliugs, one for the Fathers, another for the Cap- 
tain, and the third for a magazine. Hardly were these pre- 
parations completed, when an attack was made on the Mis- 
sions by the natives, incited by the Hecherosos or Sorcerers, 
in which the latter were defeated. It was not until later 
that the enterprise and energy of Father Ugarte made the 
Missions independent of the constant danger of extinction by 
famine. Father Tierra petitioned the Government that the 
garrison should be paid on the burgs' account, as others on 
the frontiers were; saying, however, that happen what 
would, he and Father Piccolo should remain, even though 
left alone with the savages. Still, as they had indulged in 
the hope of the submission of the country to the dominion 
of Spain, he requested that they would bestow on California 
a small vessel. The Viceroy treated this very coldly, and 
offered one thousand crowns for the use of the Missions; but 
Ugarte declined receiving it. He said that 30,000 crowns 
per annum had been offered to the Order, and much had 
been accomplished by them already without aid from Gov- 
ernment. About this time tidings of the California enter- 
prise reached the Court of Spain, and some interest was ex- 
cited; large sums were promised but were never paid. Re- 



14 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

ports were spread that the Fathers had found great treasures 
in California. This was not enough; troubles almost always 
come together. Mendoza, the Captain of the garrison, see- 
ing no chance of making a fortune, and being weary of the 
restraints the Fathers imposed upon him, with regard to em- 
ploying Indians in the pearl fishery, wrote to Spain in this 
manner: " I see no other remedy for putting a stop to these 
" romantic and rash schemes, than to give an account to the 
" General of the Order, desiring him that he would order 
" home these two religious fanatics, and secure them in a 
" place where they may receive the punishment they de- 
" serve;" and he adds, " for my part, imprison me and chain 
" me in a castle, as a warning to those that come after me, 
" that they may not be carried away by such delusions." 
These reports, which were widely circulated, cooled the zeal 
of a great many contributors, and placed the Fathers in a 
worse position than ever. They only now waited to dismiss 
their garrison, and remain alone among Indians often hostile, 
until they heard news from Mexico. Iu the meantime, hav- 
ing given up all hopes of further assistance, but still undis- 
mayed and hopeful, Ugarte resolved to take his share in the 
labors and dangers of his brethren, and having collected 
what he could, left Mexico on the 3d of December, 1700, and 
commenced the life of pioneer, missionary and explorer, 
which was to be his to the end. 

MISSIONARY WORK. 

Ugarte went by way of Guadalajara, and gave orders to 
send the long boat with provisions to Loreto. There he found 
the Fathers not only bearing the weight ot neglect and disap- 
pointment, but also on very short allowance of provisions, no 
supplies having been received since October. However, in 
a few days, the boat with provisions from Sinaloa arrived. 
Tierra was then absent, having gone to Sonora to collect as- 
sistance. There he met Rino, and they sent on from Guay- 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 15 

mas beasts for breeding and provisions. Rino, who was by 
nature a geographer and explorer, discussed with SalvaTierra 
schemes for subjecting these vast and unknown regions to the 
king of Spain; and they decided that while one should carry 
his spiritual conquests along Upper California, the other should 
penetrate and subjugate the interior of the country. 

These men must have had heroic souls. Poor, unsupported, 
characterized as insane fools deserving restraint by the Cap- 
tain of their own garrison, they agitate these projects as 
calmly and quietly as if within the shadow of the college 
walls at Ingolstadt or Mexico. 

Rino informed his friend of the long and perilous journey 
in which he had discovered that Lower California was not an 
island but a peninsula; how he came to the junction of the 
great river Colorado with the Gila, and came within sight of 
the great Southern Sea, as they called the Pacific Ocean. 
Tierra desired him to undertake a second journey, to cross 
from Sonora to the Colorado, and then to proceed along the 
coast of Lower California on the shores of the gulf, to the 
Mission of Loreto. When they arrived at San Marcalo, Rino 
remarked it as the only place on the coast proper for settling 
a mission, the soil being fit- for tillage and pasture, and 
abounding in water. They continued their journey until 
they had a clear view of the cordillera of California. Pro- 
visions now grew short, so they decided to return, Father 
Rino to San Marcalo, to establish a Mission there, and Salva 
Tierra back to Souora to collect for his Mission, and from 
thence to sail to Loreto. 

Ugarte and Salva Tierra met at Loreto, in the spring of 
the year 1701. Ugarte had, at first, no license to remain, but 
obtained one through his colleague, and the friends so united 
in their work, faith and zeal, had the privilege of remaining 
together for awhile, as it was necessary for Ugarte to learn 
the language. 

Mendoza, the choleric Captain, became more and more 



16 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

troublesome ; he still hankered after the pearl fishery, for 
which the gulf of California is celebrated, but the Fathers 
would not allow the Indians to be oppressed, and after a series 
of appeals to the authorities, and recriminations with the 
Fathers, Mendoza resigned his post. 

At the end of the year, Ugarte having become somewhat 
familiar with the language, established a Mission in the 
Yigge mountains, called St. Xavier. He set out with a few 
soldiers, but the soldiers gave him so much trouble, that he 
preferred to remain alone among the Indians, committing 
himself to Providence. He spent the whole day alone. At 
night an Indian boy came to the door of his humble dwell- 
ing. He received him kindly, entertained him and sent a 
message by him to the tribe, desiring that they should come 
and see him, as the soldiers were all gone. 

The ex-Professor of Philosophy had work enough before 
him in his new home; not only to teach religious truth as he 
understood it, but to teach them to live as a self-supporting 
community, to discipline these fierce, untamed, nomadic 
people into the strictest form of obedience. This is a very 
interesting part of the social problem the Fathers attempted 
to solve. They builded wiser than they knew, and though 
the contact of advanced races with those less progressed in- 
evitably discourages and oppresses the latter, still, these 
peaceful conquerors sacrificed no lives, made holocaust of no 
whole tribes, as did the military conquerors of Mexico and 
Peru. They sought to gather together and bind, not to tear 
apart and destroy, and their memory has a soothing charm, 
a magnetic influence that is felt in approaching the places 
where they lived and worked; for the spirit of no thought, no 
deed, no effort, ever transacted on this earth is lost, but remains 
forever, and is as perceptible in its effluence as is the mush 
which was used in building certain chambers in the Pyra- 
mids. Ugarte had to alienate these Indians from their ca- 
reer and change their modes of life. He taught them to 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 17 

work, as well by example as by precept, was himself ever 
first and foremost; farmer, bricklayer, carpenter, as well as 
priest. He seemed to be everywhere present, and had need 
of all his mildness and gentleness, as well as energy, to sus- 
tain him in his labors with an unthrifty and lazy people. 
Then was first developed by civilized man the fertility of 
this wondrous California soil. Ugarte made choice of good 
land, which produced abundantly. He planted vines, raised 
plentiful harvests of wheat, maize, and other grains, bred 
horses and sheep, and not only supplied the wants of his own 
people, but was able to assist the mother Mission at Loreto. 
When New Spaiu was suffering from scarcity occasioned by 
want of rain, he says, " We eat here good bread of our own 
harvests." Then he bethought himself of clothing. His 
sheep being sufficiently increased, he himself made the dis- 
taff, spinning-wheel and looms, and sent to Tepique for a 
master weaver, to teach the Indians and superintend the 
manufacture. 

In the meantime, Salva Tierra had been summoned to 
Mexico on business. The Government felt that the missiona- 
ries were a power, and wished to have some understanding 
with them for its own purposes, but how is it possible for 
politicians and tricksters to understand the aims and hopes 
of men who have risen far above their times, and above them- 
selves, who have borne the burden and heat of the day, who 
have communed with the stars in their lonely night watches, 
who have been accustomed to rely ou God and on themselves, 
to whom all forms of danger and hardship are familiar, whose 
daily bread is self-denial, and who are so accustomed to it 
that, by degrees, that bitter bread that seasons all their meat 
is become palatable to them. 

Salva Tierra was almost worn out with labor, his health 
was failing, and he was afflicted with the stone, which made 
travelling very painful to him. But he obeyed the sum- 
mons. He landed in an almost dying state, and was carried 



18 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

to Guadalajara on a litter by the Indians. There he lay sick 
for two months, unable to proceed farther, but attended by 
some of his beloved California converts. Visions rose before 
him in his parting hour of the land of his adoption, such as 
he had forseen it would be, the scene of peace and cheerful 
industry. The day was dawning ; the day star had arisen in 
his soul ; and on a beautiful summer day, in presence of his 
children and his colleagues, he was received into his heavenly 
home. 

That year a terrible hurricane swept over California. The 
fathers thought that the reason why the hills were so bare, 
was that these hurricanes swept the vegetation and soil clear 
off them. Ugarte's church and house were blown down, 
and he onty saved his life by remaining twenty-four hours 
under a rock, exposed to all the severity of the weather. 

Two more Missions were founded. The first ship ever 
built in California was built and named by Ugarte, " The 
Triumph of the Cross." What resolution ! What patience ! 
what knowledge of the savage heart it must have taken to 
make of these Indians, whom no one else has ever known 
how to utilize, farmers, weavers, and even shipbuilders. 
Surely that was a great social problem to solve, to unite ele- 
ments so diverse in a common aim. There were many mistakes 
made, doubtless ; we are all making them ; but the attempt 
was made, and to a certain extent, successfully. In six years, 
at La Paz, there was a congregation of 800 Indians ; many 
savqges were persuaded to live in friendship, and considerable 
land was cultivated. In 1721, Ugarte surveyed the Gulf of 
California in his ship " Triumph of the Cross." He verified 
Rinos' discoveries, and ascertained the position of the best ports 
and harbors; but he suffered severely from inflammatory rheu- 
matism, contracted from exposure and fatigue in bad weather. 
He also made many charts and maps. Father Lugardo con- 
secrated the whole of his private fortune to found the Mis- 
sion of San Ignacio, and planted vines, olive trees, figs, and 
sugar-cane. 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 19 

THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS. 

And who were the people who held their own against the 
conquerors of Mexico? The scattered remnants exist at pres- 
ent ; the gentle, silent Indians of the Mission, generally 
found with a great admixture of Spanish blood ; the scat- 
tered dwellers of the rancherias ; and sometimes scattered 
families building their little brush houses, as we see them in 
Los Angeles, on the laud where they are employed, but 
which they no longer own. Melancholy and scattered waifs 
of the great human family, calmly fronting an inevitable des- 
tiny with the patience aud resignatiou peculiar to the dark 
races, and those races whose doom is written, who belong 
not to the future, but to the past. They had their day too ; 
and it may be interesting to know what they were in their 
primitive condition, when they were the natural lords of all 
their surroundings, and could develop their peculiar life and 
idiosyncracies as freely as the deer of their mountains, or the 
pine trees which they so love. Many has been the piteous 
appeal to the white man to spare the pine, the Indian's bread 
and food, whose shadow is so sweet to him, and whose rich 
nuts nourish him. With the stern footsteps of destiny, as 
the white man advances, the Indian recedes and perishes. 
Individually, what does the white man gain? A life of 
fevered ambition for the attainment of an uncertain end, the 
cares which attach to the battle of life in the hand to hand 
fight which we call civilization. Is the Indian, sitting 
in the sun, with his natural wants measurably supplied, 
surrounded by his dusky family, less happy than his 
white brother, though he fronts the setting instead of the 
rising suu, whose long level rays are leading him on to the 
starlighted land of shadow, which we must all pass through, 
to hail the rising of a better and more enduring day ? 

During the time when the Indians reigned undisturbed in 
California, they had no chief whom they acknowledged, or 
to whom they paid tribute. Every family governed itsel£ 



20 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

In the rancherias, or even in the nations, there were one, two, 
or more who gave orders for the harvest, or for military 
expeditions, conducted them to the forests or sea coasts in 
search of food, and headed them in wars, ravages and depre- 
dations. These children of nature instinctively recognized 
the right of the ablest to govern, and as there was not much 
political intriguing among them, which is the curse and can- 
cer of our degenerate day, that was probably one reason why 
they were so successful in repulsing the expeditions sent out 
against them. In all other particulars than this concession 
of the right of the ablest to govern, every one was master 
of his own liberty. They had neither temples nor altars, nor 
any fixed vows, prayers or expiations. They had an idea 
of the unity of God as a pure spirit, and believed that there 
was a vast universe of spiritual beings. They said that there 
were many more inhabitants in heaven than on earth, by 
heaven meaning the great universe of spiritual beings ; and 
they had an idea that there had formerly existed great wars 
there. They had priests who were called Hecherosos or 
Socerers, who had great influence among them. These men 
claimed to hold intercourse with spirits, after the fashion of 
the classic oracles, and the modern mediums. These men 
were also physicians. They claimed that they were not only 
inspired^by spirits, but were identified with the very spirits 
themselves, who used their organs for a mouthpiece. Some- 
times they said that they had been to heaven, and communed 
with deities. It was very difficult to detach the natives from 
the influence of these spiritual guides. The boys belonging 
to the Missions would often disappear, and join in their 
mystic rites, at the time of the gathering of the Pityhayas 
nuts ; and the greatest danger to the Missions arose from 
their influence. 

Such were the people who listened to the murmur of the 
pines in the Sierras, ere the axe of the woodman had felled 
one goodly tree — who roamed in the fertile plains of the 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 21 

Sacramento, and celebrated their mystic rites in the deep 
recesses of the Yosemite. 

But the hour struck in that wonderful clock of destiny, 
which measures our lives and our days, and the greater days 
of the rise and fall of nations, in the eternal procession of 
all things ; and the men were about to appear, who, in some 
strange, inexplicable manner, were to subdue and utilize 
them, subdue them not by the sword of the flesh, but by 
that of the spirit, and utilize them as they have never been 
utilized before or since. There was a ferocity, too, about 
these formidable savages, only equalled by the almost hyena- 
like savageness of the Fiji Islanders. 

During the period of disturbance which occurred soou 
after the death of Father Ugarte, a ship put in for for fresh 
provisions. The scurvy was on board very badly. The pin- 
nace went on shore with a whole boat's crew. They had no 
sooner landed than they were killed and torn to pieces by a 
host of furious savages ; and the pinnace was quickly demol- 
ished for the sake of the nails and iron. And yet these men 
could be tamed and set to work by a few unarmed priests ! 
What could the spell be ? It was this : — That aside from 
their creed, aside from their churchiauity, these men were 
possessed of a living faith, and the submission to the Divine 
Will, not to their own will, that characterizes sincerely reli- 
gious minds; and this faith is, after all, the only power in the 
human soul that has ever been able to move political or 
social mountains. The immense power of the human will, 
energized by the Divine, has hitherto been quite under- 
estimated as a factor in the great movement of current events. 
The power that one man or one woman can exercise in this 
way is truly remarkable ; and in proportion to their numbers, 
and the closeness of their union on any one given point, 
grows the power. The California Indians, as we have shown 
from the most authentic records into which we have searched 
carefully, were a nation of spiritualists, governed by their 



22 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

mediums, as the Hecherosos really were. Thence the secret 
of their power to resist even the conqueror of Mexico ; 
thence the foiling of sucessive armaments. As in ancient 
times, at the advent of Christ, that central man through 
whose human form so much of the Divine God Light 
radiated, the Oracles became dumb. 

"Apollo from his shrine could no more divine, 
With hollow shriek the steep of Delphos leaving, 
No nightly trance or breathed spell inspired 
The pale-eyed priest in the prophetic cell." 

So these three earnest men that I have named, and their 
compeers, coming with their hearts full of a higher aspira- 
tion, were able to subdue the inferior spiritual forces, which 
the brute force of the Spanish government was unable to 
tame, even under such men as Cortez. 

I am no advocate of Romanism, but we have to free our- 
selves of all prejudice, even against Romanism. The divine 
groupings of the future will draw to us out of the Roman 
Church, out of the Protestant Church, out of the infidel and 
Spiritualist meetings, out of the kingdoms of the East and 
India, out of the farthest isles of the sea, those who may fitly 
tread the aisles of the Catholic Universal Church, which has 
no head, but our common Father, no limit, but universal 
humanity. 

REVOLT OF THE TRIBES. 

In 1730 Father Ugarte died, after thirty years labor in 
California. He entered into rest within the walls of the 
mother Mission at Loreto. A noble man was Juan Maria 
Ugarte. The inspiration of his memory will not depart as 
long as the velvet hills of California sleep in the sun, or the 
great stream of the Colorado flows into the gulf whose boun- 
daries he surveyed. He was the most energetic and practi- 
cal of the triumvirate of the three earliest pioneers of Cali- 
fornia. The loss of his powerful arm and personal influence 
was severely felt. 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 23 

A beautiful young girl was growing up in one of the Indian 
families attached to the church. She attracted the notice of 
an influential man of another tribe outside its pale, who had 
already several wives. The practice of polygamy was dis- 
couraged by the Fathers, but he succeeded in carrying her 
off, and was so enraged with the manner in which the Fath- 
ers remonstrated with him that he stirred up a general rebel- 
lion, which resulted in the destruction of several Missions, 
and the death of two Fathers. An attack was made upon 
San Ignacio, which was repulsed by the soldiers and con- 
verted Indians, and thirty prisoners were marched into 
Loreto. The Mission Indians, who had a hankering after 
their native customs, hoped to have had the pleasure of kill- 
ing them, and were disappointed when the sentence was 
commuted into the public whipping of the chief offender. 
These Indians remained for some time at the Mission, and 
were kindly treated. 

Perhaps it may not be uninteresting here to get a glimpse 
of the daily life at the Mission. Homely and simple details, 
made picturesque by their grouping and location. The 
Indians assembled at the sound of the bell in the church to 
hear mass. Then breakfast of a preparation of boiled corn, 
called atole. Then all went to work till noon. At noon 
there was a dinner of boiled corn, meat and vegetables. At 
night, devotion and more atole. It was a sort of devotional 
industrial school, in which the Fathers were head laborers, 
head cooks, physicians and priests; and each Father was at- 
tended by a soldier, who was vicegerent in the priest's ab- 
sence. Small faults were punished with whipping, for 
greater ones the penalty was the stocks. They were fur- 
nished with coarse clothes and blanket^ Everywhere the 
children were the first care. They were taught reading, 
writing, singing, and Spanish. The children from six to ten, 
the sick and the aged were provided for, and a certain allow- 
ance was given to outsiders, provided they came for instruc- 



24 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

tion. It was found that the best of these people would, with 
characteristic carelessness, waste all they gathered. So store- 
houses were built, in which the crops were placed and dis- 
tributed as necessity required, or used in helping out some 
other Mission. As we might imagine, many would prefer 
the free and vagrant life, drifting up and down the plains and 
mountains; but, after all, there was a degree of solid com- 
fort at the Mission, where, thanks to the wise forethought of 
the Fathers, the meals were regular, the clothing coarse, 
though comfortable, and a shelter from the chilly nights was 
provided, to say nothing of the aesthetic charm of the music, 
in which the sweet, melancholy modulations of the trained 
Indian voice mingled in the music of the mass, and the charm 
of color, always so attractive to the savage eye, in the vest- 
ments and ceremonies of the church. 

You might have seen, a hundred and fifty years ago, in 
some solitary valley, or creeping through a trail in the foot- 
hills, a singular cavalcade. Two priests riding foremost, 
grave, weather-beaten men; then, an escort of a few soldiers, 
in the Spanish costume of the period, and a small train of 
mules, packed with the necessaries of a journey and the fur- 
niture of a church. So they wandered through the moun- 
tains and surveyed the valleys until a suitable place was 
found. When this was done, the bells were hung on trees, 
and the call was made, " Hear ye, gentiles, come to the 
Holy Church." The mules were unpacked, the church fur- 
niture arranged in a temporary building, and the Padres, 
with their grave Spanish simplicity, would set earnestly to 
work to hunt up parishioners. In this case it was not the 
church who called the clergyman, but the clergy who called 
together the church. And it may here be worthy of remark 
that the first of those grants of land called Spanish grants, 
made in California, was to a Spanish soldier who had mar- 
ried a native convert. 

It took men of some force, physical as well as mental, to 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 25 

control these kind of parishioners. On one occasion, after 
the foundation of a Mission, and when things were just begin- 
ning to get into working order, some outside Indians came 
to mass, who permitted themselves some jesting and smoth- 
ered laughter at these novel ceremonies. One man, who 
seemed to be the wit of the party, stood within arms length 
of the Father who was performing the service; and, after 
enduring the interruption quietly for some time, the Padre at 
last stretched forth his hand, seized the offender, swayed him 
gently backward and forward two or three times, and set 
him down a sadder and a wiser man. 

As the signs of revolt began to threaten, word was sent to 
Mexico of their precarious condition, but it was treated with 
the usual indifference. The Viceroy communicated with 
Spain on the subject, but they all might have been extermi- 
nated ere succor could arrive, had it not been for the Indians 
themselves. Those not concerned in the revolt appeared to 
be seized with grief and regret, like children left without a 
father, and the head men of each friend]} 7 tribe, taking from 
the different Missions the crucifixes and ornaments which 
had been left behind, came in procession to Loreto and stood 
outside the gates of the garrison, as if making a testimony of 
their innocence of any unfriendly intentions. "You have 
"baptized us," they said, "you have taught us the name 
"and worship of the true God; you have gathered us from 
" the dry mountains to the watered vales; you have made us 
" believe that good acts bring happiness; you have made us 
" your children. Will you now forsake us? Is it just that a 
" whole nation should suffer for the sins of a few?" The 
Fathers were touched at this friendly demonstration, but 
they thought it wise to defer a few days to test their since- 
rity. The conspirators from the revolted tribes were given 
up; some were flogged, and others banished from the Mis- 
sions. One tribe, the Yaquis, assembled five hundred men 
for the relief of the Fathers. 
4 



26 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADEES ; 

"We see, then, that upon our California the curse of no 
bloodshed and massacre of native races rests, as it does upon 
the dark record of Mexico and Peru. And to what are we in- 
debted for this? Principally to the faithfulness and spiritual 
power of three men and their compeers, who devoted unre- 
servedly the whole of their life and energies to the Indians of 
California — abilities and energies that might have made their 
mark anywhere in the civilized world, and which we, who 
have inherited their labors and come into possession of a 
land freed from the terrible curse which the oppression and 
destruction of the innocent ever entails, ought never to for- 
get. They were meek, gentle, scholarly men, who could be 
very firm and very brave; geographers, explorers, tillers of 
the soil, brick-layers, handicraft-men, tailors, weavers, vine- 
dressers and priests. Well did they understand and practice 
the old monastic proverb, Laborare est orare — "To labor is to 
pray." 

THE EXPULSION OF THE JESUITS. 

We must not forget that these men were Jesuits. Nor 
can we forget all that the word Jesuitry implies — of dark 
intrigue, of unscrupulous greed for the advancement of the 
Order, or the tremendous power wielded by its compact and 
perfect discipline; but let us not, also, forget that use and good 
may reside even in the most apparently mean and false thing. 
Let us look to the spirit and not to the letter, and try, each 
individual by his or her works. The Jesuits have been ex- 
pelled in turn from almost every country in Europe. And 
why? Because they were so strong, so united in the power 
of unconditional personal surrender, that they were feared by 
the powers that be. r j ^There is hardly any limit to the power 
of an idea which becomes a religious conviction, embodied 
in ever so small a company. Its power of multiplication is 
infinite, its resources almost boundless. But the position 
taken must be affirmative, not negative; hence the weakness 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 27 

of all simply Protestant communities, though that element 
has been needed, even down to the verge of the extremest 
radicalism. Yet there is no power there, and it is felt if 
not confessed. Spiritualism also sadly tails on that side, and 
is weak for want of the grand centralization of definite, posi- 
tive power, focalized on a great religious idea suited to the 
wants of this day and generation, and more particularly 
adapted to the needs of this great American people, the ad- 
vance guard of the whole world. We have had imported 
religion as well as imported fashions. It is for this people 
yet to realize one of the highest religious and divine mani- 
festations that has yet dawned on the world. It might be 
called, as an inspired one now passed away called it, " The 
Unity Dispensation," a comforter to head and heart in the 
fierce struggles that are at hand, and the only ark that can 
safely ride on the waters that are already white with angry 
surges. Then will come organization: then will come order; 
then will come power — a power only to be attained by putting 
ourselves on one side, so that God may shine through us, and 
combining together on that principle. I will quote from some 
thoughts of Mr. Judd Pardee, published in May, 1862, some 
prophetic words on this subject: "The end of this war is 
" not peace. A bitterer struggle ensues then. The battle- 
" fields are transferred; for the God in man is roused to arms 
" by bugle blasts of inspiration against the devil in conven- 
" tionality. A three-fold conventionality, the parents of a 
" plenteous brood, oppresses, depresses, and continually im- 
" presses us. A deliverance from this saddening psychology 
" is absolutely dependent on a stronger force. The spirit of 
" conservatism, the spirit of militaryism, and the .spirit of the 
" spiritual new — these three will be wrestlers. I see that 
" the second spirit will be the greatest for a season, and a 
u military dictatorship takes the rule when Abraham Liu- 
*« coin's time is out, if not before. If the long man is not 
" ousted by assassination or a natural death ere his Presiden- 



28 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES J 

" tial close, at least afterwards comes in the iron man. A 
" known chieftain, to become yet more known, will take the 
" reins by big acclaim. Why will it be? For the reason 
" that this constitutional government is too inefficient in the 
" tightening adversity; because too flaccid in the muscles of 
"its own right arm; for exigency's sake altogether too cen- 
"treless; and, next, because a military rule must be the 
" bridge between republicanism and theocracy." 

The pulse of to-day beats at a fever heat, and men seem to 
be walking in a dream. There is little true, natural life- 
The system is either lashed up into the excitements of busi- 
ness or pleasure or braced up with stimulants toward off the 
dreaded reaction. We pass through life in a vain show, 
with only passing glimpses of our own possibilities. Will 
the kind reader pardon this digression from the calm quiet 
of the California of the Padres to our more stormy period? 

The Jesuits had now become a power; they had achieved 
that which the government failed to achieve, and thence a 
dull jealousy, a feeling of suspicion, a petty spite on many 
quarters. Still the circumstance of the loss of the boat's 
crew made it expedient to send out more succor to the Mis- 
sions. The Order also sent out some new laborers. In 1745 
there were sixteen Mission stations and 25,000 converts. 
Once established, success was sure. 

The good taste and judgment of the church in selecting 
building sites is proverbial. Peace and plenty crown their 
efforts. Flocks and herds, corn, wine and oil were sustained 
and produced by the genial and fertile soil. The word, 
home, so dear to the heart must have been realized by these 
priests in the land of their adoption. Happy those who were 
laid at rest in the sunny soil they loved so well, ere the gath- 
ering tempest broke and they were expelled, banished, 
driven from the familiar gardens, the familiar faces, the fa- 
miliar haunts so dear to the studious and the solitary. Ban- 
ishment, expulsion, is a bitter word. When we have made 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 29 

a place of repose, after great effort and privation, it is hard 
at once to abandon it. 

The Jesuits labored in the footsteps of Ugarte till 1776, 
unsuspicious, undisturbed, increasing in wealth and influence. 
Almost every year brought ships from the Phi Hi pine Islands, 
with crews sick of the scurvy, for them to feed and succor. 
Commodore Anson, among others, paid them a visit, but 
spoke very discouragingly of the country, saying that there 
was no other commodity but a little wine there, nor any 
hopes of there ever being any. But they were abundantly 
supplied with the necessaries, and even some of the luxuries 
of life. 

The government, in the meantime, knowing that the Order 
were more masters in California than they were, sent ships 
with secret and sealed orders; and so well did they accom- 
plish their design that in one night every Jesuit was seized 
and made ready to leave the province. These men, so va- 
liant for their work, were not valiant for themselves. They 
went away as quietly as they came, leaving their works be- 
hind them. This was in 1766. 

THE ADVENT OF THE FRANCISCANS. 

In 1767 came the Franciscans, with Father Jumpero Lerra, 
a scholar, an earnest and sincere man, who was actuated by 
the spirit, and trod in the footsteps of Ugarte and Salva 
Tierra. Most of the Missions in Upper California were 
founded by the Franciscans, and the founding of these new 
Missions was necessarily attended with more or less privation. 
In 1770 the Mission of San Diego was founded — old San 
Diego — and provisions ran so short, that Lerra had recourse 
to prayer; but, most opportunely, the "San Antonio" ar- 
rived, and he sailed in her for Monterey. In a letter, which 
is still preserved, he says, " On the 3d of June, 1771, being 
" Pentecusl, WW assembled under the shade of a large oak 
" tree. The Veni Creator was sung, and mass said, after 



30 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

" which, we all dined together in a shady place by the 
" beach." After many inquiries for absent friends, he says, 
" I have not had a letter from any Christian country for more 
" than a year." In 1772, the Mission of San Gabriel, near 
Los Angeles, was founded. Father Lerra writes from'thence: 
" The milk of the cows, and the vegetables of the garden, are 
" our two great sources of subsistence, but even these begin 
" to get scarce. But it is not for this I feel mortified, but 
" because we have not been able to go on with more Mis- 
sions." After asking that more missionaries may be sent, he 
adds, as if in a moment of discouragement: " but let those 
" who come here come well provided with patience and 
" charity, and let them pass on in good humor, and they may 
" become rich — I mean in troubles." 

In 1772, San Luis Obispo was founded. In the same year 
San Diego was attacked, and one of the Fathers killed. In 
1776, that year so remarkable as the era of republican lib- 
erty in this country, while "Washington, Jefferson and the 
rest of their illustrious compeers were laying wide and deep 
the foundations of our republican institutions in the East, 
Jumpero Lerra founded the Mission of San Francisco, and 
surveyed the harbor. At the time of the secularization in 
1835, forty leagues of land were attached to the mission of 
San Francisco, there was 25,000 dollars of specie in the trea- 
sury, and 35,000 dollars worth of merchandize; its hills were 
covered with cattle, its barns well filled. Jumpero Lerra 
died at the Mission of San Francisco at the age of 71. He 
was a man of various and extensive learning; had known the 
life of Courts and the amenities of polished society, but he 
kept before him the same undeviating purpose and unswerv- 
ing aim which had marked his predecessors. Shortly after 
the founding of the Mission of San Francisco, the Mission of 
Santa Clara, Santa Barbara and five others were founded. 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 31 

THE DEPARTURE OF THE FRANCISCANS. 

The seed sown was now beginning to produce its result in 
a harvest of temporal prosperity. What was the capital with 
which these enterprises were started ? In the first place, 
voluntary contributions were invested by trustees in Mexico 
under the name of the California Pious Fund. Four hun- 
dred dollars a year was the salary of each priest. 

Such was the capital with which these establishments were 
started, and from which they grew in wealth and prosperity, 
so as to make them too tempting a prey to a needy and un- 
scrupulous Government to be left untouched. During the 
time of the prosperity of these great self-supporting commu- 
nities, they each possessed from 30,000 to 100,000 head of 
cattle, besides sheep. They exported large quantities of 
hides, tallow, grain and wine. So much confidence did they 
inspire, that the word of a Padre was good to the American 
and English houses with whom they had dealings. They 
only were capable of throwing all this produce into the mar- 
ket. The Indians had all their wants supplied, and lived in 
peace and plenty. 

After the period of prosperity we have indicated, the time 
drew nigh when the Franciscans too must quit the soil where 
their unremitting labors had not been able to secure them 
either a home or a country. In 1825, Mexico threw oft' her 
allegiance to the Spanish crown, and became an independent 
nation. The Mexican General, Echuadra, arrived in Monte- 
rey, Upper California, with full power to receive the submis- 
sion of California to the Mexican Government. The Fran- 
ciscans were requested to take the oath of allegiance to the 
new Government. This they could not do without the con- 
sent of the Prefecto, as the head of the Order was styled. 
The Spanish Prefecto declared himself unwilling to take the 
oath, until his king had abandoned the sovereignty of Cali- 
fornia. Upon this, Echuadra had him arrested and banished 
to Manilla. He also told the Padres that their yearly stipend 



32 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

of 400 dollars was withheld, and that they were subject to 
his orders. The California Pious Fund, which had been in- 
vested in Mexico, formed but a small morsel for the hungry 
office-seekers and politicians who beset the new Government. 
The Mexican authorities in California assigned lands to the 
Indians employed on the Missions, and told the Padres that 
they would relieve them of the burden of their temporal 
affairs; that they might better attend to their spiritual 
functions. The Fathers thus lost their influence on the com- 
munity, and everything went to decay. The small stipend 
which supplied their wants had placed them in a position to 
command respect and to labor for the world. They saw, now 
that their work here was ended, that their pleasant fields 
must soon be desolate, their gardens deserted, their hearths 
solitary. Fearing starvation for the Indians, and seeing how 
they were likely to be defrauded, they even encouraged them 
in the yearly branding of the cattle, when the animals were 
coralled, and each proprietor had his private mark branded 
on tlxe shoulder of the animal, to let some go wild in the 
woods as a resource in time of need. 

At Santa Monica, 17 or 18 miles from Los Angeles, along 
the coast, there were, seven or eight years ago, wild cattle in 
the woods. Father Antonio Pera came to San Luis Rey in 
1798. He built a small thatched cottage, and asked for some 
Indians and soldiers from another Mission. After a residence 
of 34 years, he left the place stocked with 60,000 head of 
domesticated animals of all sorts, fields yielding 13,000 bushels 
of grain per year, a church and a complete set of buildings, 
and yet, after all these years of labor, he left with only suffi- 
cient funds to join his convent in Mexico, and throw himself 
upon the charity of his Order. In 1827, some of the Padres 
left in American ships for Boston, and thence to Spain. In 
1835, others left for Mexico. Some died in the country, and 
were buried under the churches of their Missions. This 
year the power of the priests was transferred to Government 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 33 

officers, called Administradores — one on each Mission. Any 
one who understands the general style and manner of acting 
of Government officials, with some rare exceptions, can realize 
that this was not a beneficial change. Appointed generally 
by favoritism, subject to be displaced at an uncertain date, 
the system otters a premium to all the greed and selfishness 
of our nature. From 1835 to 1848, a period of thirteen years, 
California was under the rule of Mexican and Spanish Gover- 
nors. Don Pio Pico, one of the last of these Governors, still 
resides near Los Angeles. In 1848, the great year of revolu- 
tions, California was ceded to the United States, together 
with Texas and ISTew Mexico, in consideration of fifteen millions 
in money, the assumption of the Mexican debt to United 
States citizens, and the right to the navigation of the gulf. 

RESUME OF THE WHOLE. 

Our survey is completed. Very rapid and very much con- 
densed it has necessarily been. The slow, tranquil years 
drifted by in the sunny Missions of the Pacific slope, rightly 
so called, while in the East, on the Atlantic slope, a great 
empire was being born; and while the Padres were doing 
their work on the Pacific, Washington, Jefferson, Paine, and 
their illustrious compeers, were building up with sword and 
pen, as God's own appointed ministers, the foundations of the 
mighty American Nation, whose dominion spans the continent, 
and is only terminated by the Pacific Ocean. The torch of 
liberty lighted here j>assed over to Europe, and created the 
wars of the Revolution and the Empire; thence, the begin- 
ning of a series of convulsions that has not yet terminated, 
but is only gathering strength for another and more tremen- 
dous outbreak. 

We do not claim for our friends, the Padres, that they were 

perfect, any more than we ourselves are; we simply say that 

they were in earnest, which is more than some of us are. 

The ranks of reform are to-day filled with a clamorous crowd 

5 



34 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADEES ; 

who all claim to be leaders, masters, teachers. Individual 

sovereignty is running as wild as individual despotism did in 

former times. The true leader and organizer in our ranks, 

the Christos of the nineteenth century, must be the servant, 

not the master; the servant of man and the servant of God, 

for how can he command who has never learned to obey? 

We have set before you a lesson in two parts, clearly defined 

and full of instruction. Part 1st. The Jesuits in California. 

Part 2d. The Franciscans. The world is a great school, in which 

• 
millions of souls are being educated, and all there is of any real 

worth in life is the education our souls get out of its ex- 
periences. Two classes were called up on the Pacific Coast, 
and our friends the Padres were the monitors. The great 
schoolmaster knew when it was best the lessons should be 
ended; he knows also what other classes he designs to call 
up. There is more order in the great world history than 
some are disposed to admit. 

The best and most enduring part of the teachings of the 
Padres, is what they themselves suspected least. It has left 
its lessons on every stone of their deserted dwellings, every 
tree which their hands planted, and consists in the example 
which they havejleft to the world of the practical success and 
self-supporting nature of great industrial organizations, even 
when commenced and carried on in the face of the greatest 
disadvantages, and with comparatively small means. The 
problem of industrial organization and social reform, will be 
that in which the generations that are to follow us, our chil- 
dren and our children's children, will be most deeply inte- 
rested. The Padres gave some good and wise hints in this 
direction; for this will their names live when conquerors and 
kings are forgotten. The silent influence of the peaceful 
Spaniards will inaugurate new industrial organizations on 
soil already consecrated to that purpose; not in vain, to our 
State, yet in its infancy, but commanding in an almost un- 
exampled manner the elements of success, has the lesson of 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 85 

the great industrial and self-supporting communities, known 
as the Missions of California, been given. The religious ele- 
ment has been admirably adapted to sustain man in the sea- 
sons of darkness through which he has passed the night and 
twilight of the world's more perfect day. In prosperity, the 
same religious element is the great regulating element. The 
spiritual or coronal region is at the summit; like heaven's 
overarching dome, it presides over intellect, affection, passion. 
And yet all these must have their place; in denying these, 
we in so tar deny God. Yet our' friends, the Padres, were 
not to blame in the denial they inflicted on the two latter 
elements. They saw that the God man, that is Humanity, 
personified by their familiar emblem, the lacerated and suf- 
fering Christ of the Crucifix, was still in a state of crucifixion, 
but they did not fully realize that a complete renewal and 
consecration of all his attributes must follow upon his entrance 
into new and higher phases of existence. When, instead of 
the stereotyped crucifix, we look to the risen, ascended and 
spiritual Christ, the ideal God man, that is humanity, repre- 
sented by Him, the regeneration of the world will have be- 
gun. The time is not distant. Tempests and storms will 
usher in a brighter day. Nowhere more strikingly than in 
our own State, are the workings of the great volcanic forces 
manifest. Nowhere is earth adorned with a fresher garland 
of beauty. Mighty canons are split through huge rocks, 
revealing their hidden secrets. Metalliferous rocks are per- 
meated with precious metals, marble, coal and health-giving 
mineral springs. Nature has prepared the place for a labora- 
tory of new ideas, and a new social order. Providence has 
given it a history to match with its strange and singular 
beauty, its magnificent opulence, its wonderful ferti lity . Who 
were its conquerors? Ask Cortez. No, the proud Spaniard 
turns away humiliated. In the serene mansions of the just 
made perfect, shall we invoke the benignant presence of 
Salva Tierra and Ugarte. They smile with an ineffable smile, 



36 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES ; 

those men of gentle and heroic endurance, at whose hearths 
no woman smiled, as they point to the beautiful form of her 
whom they call the conqueror of California — the beautiful 
symbol of divinely regenerated woman, idealized in Mary of 
Galilee. To-day the emancipation and divine regeneration 
of Woman, is the great question to which all other issues are 
comparatively trivial. This must inaugurate new departures 
both in social and governmental science. I Cannot refrain 
from adding a few thoughts suggested by the above facts, 
which open a wide and brilliant perspective. 

THOUGHTS AND THEORIES. 

The first idea suggested is the necessity of a true idea of 
government as a necessity of well-being. The most god-like 
minds have either terminated their career by a violent death, 
as Christ did, or they have led lives of poverty and obscurity 
in an age that did not recognize their truth, because the 
power of selfishness, the animal in man, was too strong for 
the spiritual, and quenched its heaven-sent light. The idea 
of government has been exclusively masculine, as the idea 
of God has been. Now, the idea of the entire masculinity of 
God is, as F. R. McKinley said, "a swell of presumptuous 
vanity in the mere male mind." The God-head is bi-sexual, 
whether a principle or a personality, or it could not exist — 
could not permeate all nature and be represented in all na- 
ture by the divine sexual element in all its various combina- 
tion and modification. " All things, by a law divine," 
says Shelly, "with one another's being mingle." The idea 
of God in the Romish Church is essentially bi-sexual. Mary 
represents the feminine side of God; hence another element 
of power. In the last century an obscure English woman, 
Ann Lee, for the first time in any Protestant community, 
proclaimed the idea of a father and mother God. She came 
to America and founded the now wealthy Order of .Sha- 
kers, among whom the first spiritual manifestations took place 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 37 

long previous to those at Rochester. The idea of God the 
Supreme, or whatever man believes in as such, creates and 
modifies all our ideas of government, so that the recognition 
of woman in the government of the community by the 
Shakers, was a natural consequence of their religious belief. 

You ask, Whence had the best ideas of government their 
rise? I answer, From the highest inspirations of men in some 
critical moment. Such was Magna Charta, such the Declara- 
tion of Independence and the Constitution of the United States. 
But as time rolls on, with the progress of development fresh 
necessities arise and fresh inspiration is given. The water of 
a river gets turbid and muddy near a large city where many 
people and factories are congregated; but let us make a pil- 
grimage to its source — leave the haunts of men for the home 
of the beaver; and then up higher, leaving the hemlocks to 
where the pines point straight to heaven; what do you find? 
A gentle, lovely rill, fed from the clouds and dews of heaven; 
and it so happy up there with the birds and the wind and 
the sweet shade of trees, that it murmurs a low song of sweet 
content. As in case of war aud devastation men flee to the 
mountains to hide until the scourge is passed over, so in 
times of extreme necessity, when the birth or death of a 
nation or civilization is in question, then are men driven to 
the high places of divine and elevated thought to seek inspi- 
rations for the emergency. How can any of us tell how near 
such a time may be at hand, and how are we prepared for 
it? 

I feel very certain that all governments founded on force, 
must sooner or later fall into a chaotic condition. Force is 
the supremely masculine element, and must go to its utmost 
— almost to the destruction of the human race, if it were pos- 
sible — ere he will invoke the aid of the feminine element, 
the other side of God. 

The uneasiness of the feminine element is affecting socie- 
ties — it is affecting governments. A new idea is always a 



38 THE CALIFORNIA OF THE PADRES J 

disturbing element, no matter in how beautiful and mild a 
form it comes. Even the gentle and sweet words of the man 
of Nazareth were as burning coals and firebrands to existing 
governments. Justice, love and truth, not force, must be 
the strength of a true government. And how is it possible 
for man to be evenly balanced on these divine principles 
alone? A solitary man or woman may be indeed oftentimes 
alone; lonely as was Elijah in the desert, and yet so near the 
father heart or mother heart of God that they can draw 
down from the skies the very elements they need for their 
succor. The voice of the Comforter is never absent if we 
are only in a condition to hear it. "Peace I leave with you; 
my peace I give unto you; not as the world giveth give I 
unto you." Great leaders, great organizers, germinal centres 
of thought, are God's greatest gift to man. 

Our friends the Padres proved themselves capable of 
utilizing very intractable elements in the face of the greatest 
difficulties, not so much by the masculine power of force as by 
the feminine power of love and inspiration. For this are 
their efforts interesting to the student of social science. 

The great life of humanity, as a whole, may be compared 
to a tree, wide and branching and bearing various and goodly 
fruits, according as the 'influences of the sky, the sun, the 
moon, the rains, the dews are favorable to its growth and de- 
velopment, and as the deep striking roots draw nourishment 
in the rich, moist earth below. Still, all the possibilities of 
humauity are in the seed, the germ. Not one of rich and 
beautiful fruits that has blossomed so sweetly and fruited so 
grandly on the life tree of the nations, but was in essence in 
the rough kernel, the undeveloped seed, planted here on the 
earth ages and ages ago. One after another the conspicuous 
fruits appeared which made the glory of this life-tree of the 
nations. And these were the few men who have swayed the 
earth, not only while they lived, but ages after their disap- 
pearance from the scene of action. Moses in Egypt, Brahma 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 39 

in India, Confucius in China, Socrates in Greece, Mahomet 
in Arabia, were conspicuous century flowers in this tree of 
the ages. Their possibilities were all in the common seed of 
our humanity. Everything that they have reached or that 
has yet beeu reached is not equal to the capacities of hu- 
manity in ages yet to come. 

A great man, a great hero, a great prophet, is God's repre- 
sentative here on earth. He appears ; he grows ; he becomes 
a centre to millions of minds ; he shines in the light of God 
like a steady, fixed star, while the tides of humanity go fluc- 
tuating and ebbing, now into light, through the gate of birth, 
and then into that other eternity whither we all are hastening. 
These guiding lights in the world's march have been few 
and tar between. 

Nearly 1900 years ago the world tree flowered and bore 
its tairest fruit. No such fruit has it borne before or since. 
Its perfume has sweetened the world's air. Its gentle aroma 
has been preserved as a divine benediction, not only in indi- 
vidual lines which it has made brighter and better, but it has 
permeated governments, and with subtle sweetness given life 
to new ideas. Where should we have been to-day if Christ 
had not lived? Certainly, not where we are now. His life 
was just the opposite of the selfish accumulation of forces by 
one man for his own benefit. It was the giving up of self to 
God ; and then a giving of God to the world, the hungry 
world, the dying world, the world that is dying for just such 
life. He lived, and loved, and died ; and the heart of the 
most advanced portion of the world has gone after him ever 
since — the Christos consolator ! the consoling Christ! 
There is a throbbing hope felt everywhere of some new 
light, some new hope breaking from the spheres beyond. 

In the burning plains of India, the Hindoo is waiting for 
Vishnu. 



40 THE CALIFORNIA OP THE PADRES ; 

" Nine times hath Brahma's wheels of lightning hurled 

" His awful presence o'er a prostrate world. 

" Nine times hath guilt through all her giant frame, 

" Convulsive trembled, as the mighty came ; 

" But Heaven shall burst her starry gates again; 

" He comes ; dread Brahma shakes the sunless sky 

" With lightning speed, and thunders from on high, 

" Heaven's fiery horse beneath his warrior form, 

" Paws the light clouds, and flickers in the storm." 

The Zuni Indian upon the plains of Mexico every mora- 
ine 1 turns his face to the East and calls for the return of his 
lost Montezuma. We are all waiting for the great life-tree 
of the world to put forth another great century blossom, to 
bear another wondrous fruit, which shall be to other ages 
what Christ has been to us — a reappearance of the glory of 
God in the shape of man. "I am the way, the truth and 
"the life," said Christ. "No man cometh to the Father 
but by me." But now we have got to draw nigh also to the 
infinite and ineffable tenderness of the Divine Mother. 

This same indwelling divine power, blossoming out through 
humanity, may produce fruits more gloriously conspicuous 
than any that have yet appeared. What will be the shape 
and hue of the next great flower that the tree of humanity 
will put forth after so many years' repose? From our pres- 
ent needs, I should say that we require an organizer, a judge, 
a ruler, a leader, a divine law giver. He will, then, perhaps, 
at no distant date, appear, declare himself, and be recognized 
as one of the world's great saviours. After a while he will 
disappear, and his memory will be embalmed in loving grati- 
tude for hundreds of years, till his work, too, is done, and the 
growing needs of humanity call for a fresh manifestation. By 
that time the laws of our nature will have been learned more 
thoroughly, much of the discipline the world needs in its 
present childish and ignorant state will have been gone 
through with, and the world's great heart will pant for some 
further manifestation. They will wait then as we are wait- 
ing now, only in a much more advanced state. Order will 
have taken the place of disorder, the laws of life will be bet- 



OR, FOOTPRINTS OF ANCIENT COMMUNISM. 4 1 

ter understood, and still there will be a waiting even then, 
a desiring and aspiring for something higher. It will be 
again answered, and a golden fruit of divinest love will bless 
and cheer the world. We are not prepared for this manifes- 
tation yet. That will be a joyous time. Still, looking into 
the sunlighted splendors of that happy day, I can see a time 
when there will come a longing for something more; when 
the happy earth will wait and watch again, not in sadness 
and almost in fear, as we are waiting now, but with the sunny 
hope of the child who is called to the grander rooms of its 
father's mansion, where more glorious guests are assembled. 
At last, then, the great life-tree will blossom from its very 
central stem, filling earth with the fragrance of the heavens, 
and this last great flower, beyond, which I can see no farther, 
will be called Harmony. A sweet daj 7 will then bless the 
earth, so cool, so calm, so bright, the true bridal of the earth 
and sky. 




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